Stalin let go of the president’s hand and then shook his head. “But that is not what made him angry,” he said gruffly, taking the Beketovka File from Pavlov, his translator, and placing it gingerly on the president’s lap. “This is what made him abandon the talks.”
“What is it?” asked Roosevelt.
“It’s a dossier prepared by German intelligence for your eyes, Mr. President,” said Stalin. “It purports to provide details of atrocities committed by Red Army soldiers against German prisoners of war. It was given to the Fuhrer by one of your people this morning. The dossier is a forgery, of course, and we believe that it was prepared by die-hard Fascists in Germany with the intention of driving a wedge between the United States and the Soviet Union. Of course Hitler knew nothing about its provenance. Why should he? A commander in chief cannot see every piece of disinformation that emanates from his own counterintelligence department. When he saw the dossier, however, he assumed, incorrectly, that the lies and calumnies it contained regarding the atrocious treatment of German POWs were true, and he reacted as any commander in chief would, by calling off the talks with those he believed carried out these atrocities.”
“You’re saying that this dossier was prepared for my deception?” said Roosevelt. “And handed over to Hitler by one of my people?”
Stalin lit a cigarette, coolly. “That is correct.”
“But I don’t recall ever seeing such a file,” said Roosevelt. “Have I, Harry?”
“I saw it, Mr. President,” said Hopkins. “I decided that it was inappropriate for you to see it in the present circumstances. Certainly until we’d had a chance to evaluate it properly.”
“Then I still don’t understand,” said Roosevelt. “Who gave this dossier to Hitler?”
“Your Jewish doctor of philosophy.”
I felt a chill as Stalin stared balefully at me with his yellow, almost Oriental, eyes.
“Jesus Christ, Professor. Is this true? Did you give this dossier to Hitler?”
I hesitated to call Stalin a liar to his face, but it was clear what the Soviet leader was trying to do. Stalin could hardly explain why Hitler had left without bringing up the Beketovka File. And that risked the possibility that Roosevelt might lay responsibility for the Fuhrer’s departure on the Soviets themselves.
I had to hand it to him: insisting that the file was a forgery was the best way of avoiding any potential embarrassment. And throwing the blame on me put the ball squarely back in the American court.
Believing Roosevelt would never forgive me if I challenged Stalin’s assertion that the file was a forgery, I decided to appeal to the president’s sense of fair play.
“I did give it to him, Mr. President. When I was struggling with Agent Pawlikowski on the conference table, the files got mixed up. When Mr. Hopkins told me to hand our position papers to Hitler, I mistakenly handed over the Beketovka File instead.”
“That’s right, Mr. President,” Hopkins said. “It was an accident. And partly my fault. I was holding on to the position papers when I told Willard to hand them over. I didn’t realize I was holding them. I guess I was kind of shocked myself. Under the circumstances, it could have happened to anyone.”
“Perhaps,” said Stalin.
“I don’t think we should forget that but for Professor Mayer’s presence of mind,” added Hopkins, “the Fuhrer would probably be dead, and our hostages in Berlin, Mr. Hull, and Mr. Mikoyan, would certainly have been executed by now.”
Stalin shrugged. “Speaking for myself, I think I should prefer to have seen Hitler dead on the floor of that conference room than to have him walk out of these peace talks. I cannot speak for Mr. Hull, but I know that Mr. Mikoyan would gladly have gone to the wall if it had meant us being rid of a monster like Hitler.” Stalin sniffed unpleasantly and wiped his mustache with the back of a liver-spotted hand. Waving dismissively in my direction, he said, “It seems to me that, thanks to your translator, we now find ourselves with the worst of all possible outcomes.”
“With all due respect, Mr. President,” I said, “I think that Marshal Stalin is, perhaps, being a little unfair.”
I was still smarting from Stalin’s description of me as “the Jewish doctor.” I was already cursed with the knowledge that I had saved the life of perhaps the most evil man in history, and I was damned if I could see why I should have to shoulder the responsibility for the failure of the peace talks as well.
“All right, Professor, all right,” said Roosevelt, gesturing with the flat of his hand that I should try to keep calm.
“Are we to worry about what these parrots, our interpreters, think is fair and what is unfair?” snorted Stalin. “Perhaps your man is one of these American capitalists who wants to see his country’s armies in Europe if only because he imagines that the Soviet Union wishes to make an empire for itself. Such as the British have made in India. I’m told that his mother is one of the richest women in America. Perhaps he hates Communists more than he hates Nazis. Perhaps that is why he gave the forgery to Hitler.”
I wished that I could have mentioned my previous membership in the Austrian Communist Party. But Roosevelt was already trying to change the subject.
“I think that India is certainly ripe for a revolution, Marshal Stalin,” he said. “Don’t you? From the bottom up.”
Recognizing that perhaps he had gone too far in his denunciation of me, Stalin shrugged. “I’m not sure about that,” he said. “India’s caste system makes things more complicated. I doubt a revolution along the lines of the straightforward Bolshevik model is a realistic proposition.” Stalin smiled thinly. “But I can see that you’re tired, Mr. President. I only came to tell you that, if you are agreeable, we will reconvene at four o’clock in the main conference hall, with Mr. Churchill. So I’ll leave you now, to rest a while and to gather your strength for what we must discuss. A second front in Europe.”
And with that, Stalin was gone, leaving each of us in openmouthed amazement. It was Roosevelt who spoke first.
“Professor Mayer? I don’t think Uncle Joe likes you very much.”
“No, sir. I don’t think he does. And I’m counting myself lucky that I’m an American and not a Russian. Otherwise I guess I’d be facing a firing squad.”
Roosevelt nodded wearily. “Under the circumstances,” he said, “it might be best if you went back to Camp Amirabad. After all, it’s not as if we’ll be needing your interpreting services anymore. Not now that the Fuhrer has gone. And there’s no sense aggravating Stalin any further by your presence here in the Russian compound.”
“I’m sure you’re right, sir.” I walked toward the door of the drawing room. There, with my fingers on the door handle, I stopped and, looking back at the president, added: “Just for the record, Mr. President, as someone who knows about German intelligence, it’s my considered opinion that the Beketovka File is one hundred percent genuine and accurate. You can take that from a man who was a member of the Austrian Communist Party when he was a lot younger and less wise than he is now. And there’s nothing Stalin can say that will change that.”
Standing in the door of the Russian embassy, I took a deep, unsteady breath of the warm afternoon air. I closed my eyes and reflected on the extraordinary events of the day and my unwitting role in the history of Hitler’s peace. It was a story that would probably never be told because it was a history of lies and dissembling and hypocrisy, and it revealed the greatest truth of history: that truth itself is an illusion. I was a part of that big lie now. I always would be.
I opened my eyes to find myself facing a tubby-looking man wearing the uniform of a British RAF Commodore and smoking a seven-inch Romeo y Julieta.